


Love me tender

by Talavin



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Compliant, Community: capkink, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Quote: I'm with you 'til the end of the line, loosely based on capkink prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-23
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 20:06:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4638510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talavin/pseuds/Talavin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve is captured by Hydra, who for lack of any other containment options, activate the Winter Soldier and order the man to "take care of Captain America". They really should have been more specific. </p><p>-</p><p>OR: Taking care of Captain America is a task that the Soldier's body seems to remember how to do, even if he doesn't understand why.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love me tender

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [This, You Protect](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1752638) by [owlet](https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlet/pseuds/owlet). 



> The title of this story is from the first line of the song "Take care of you" by Jim James. The story itself is inspired by owlet's incredible fic "Infinite Coffee and Protection Detail". If you haven't read it, do so now. It's much better than this one. It is also based (loosely) on this Capkink prompt: 
> 
> "Steve is captured by whoever has the Winter Soldier at the time. (Pre-or post-CA:TWS, up to you). Thinking the that he will torture or kill him they give the Winter Soldier a slightly roughed up Steve and say something ambiguous like "he's all yours, enjoy him." However, he starts treating Steve like his pet, gently caring for him and growling at anyone who tries to get near him. Up to you if Steve knows its Bucky initially and whether or not their relationship becomes sexual. Bonus points for other Avengers coming to rescue Steve and finding him all cuddled up with the world's greatest assassin"
> 
> Trigger warnings are at the bottom. Hope you enjoy this!

When the Advanced Idea Mechanics scientists captured him, Steve couldn’t help but think that they were as surprised as he was. There were two militants in the lab that he’d infiltrated, one of which was male, short and fat with dirty, stringy hair. He looked like the kind of cowering gopher that Steve had come to associate with the underlings of the organization ever since they’d tried to assassinate the President a couple of months back. The woman, on the other hand, was slim and somewhat attractive. She didn’t exactly look like the kind of super models that AIM liked to push to the face of their organization, but her blonde hair was pinned neatly to her head and her face wasn’t the red, sweaty mess of her partner. Her hands were gripping some sort of pistol, shaking in front of her. 

This was supposed to be an easy, softball mission. After the incident with Tony and the President, basically every government agency had been on a manhunt for anyone associated with the science cult. Secret Service, CIA, FBI, MI6 you name it. All of the allies of the United States were terrified of the fact that one group could infiltrate so far into the government, nearly placing an agent in the Oval Office, in control of the largest military in the world (as well as nuclear launch codes). It had been a bureaucratic nightmare of the highest order. However, the international panic had one positive outcome in that AIM had been scoured from the four corners of the globe in a matter of months. There were still some holdouts, of course. There were certain powers who were interested in shielding any enemy of America, but for the most part AIM had been annihilated. 

For that reason, and because SHIELD was low on manpower—tied up in conflicts that Steve didn’t have the clearance to know about, apparently—Captain American had been allowed to take on a solo mission to get rid of a tiny AIM splinter cell. According to Fury, it had been a two-man (or rather, one-man-one-woman) operation. Intelligence suggested that they weren’t even truly AIM, but some other loosely affiliated organization. SHIELD wanted to know about their bosses, and so he wasn’t supposed to go in guns blazing, but rather as a friendly face, to try to coax them to the side of truth or justice or whatever it was that he was supposed to represent these days. It should be easy, Fury had said. They were just meek little lab rats, without any ideological ties to the greater movement. 

And now Steve was lying rigidly on the floor, unable to move his body except to roll his eyes around a little bit. He was never listening to Fury again.

“I can’t believe it! It worked! It actually worked,” the woman cheered, laughing the sort of nervous, relieved laugh that was unique to people who thought they’d just barely escaped a horrible fate, like getting pushed off a cliff only to land on a ledge a few feet down. 

“The I.C.E.R. is just out of development,” the blubbering man insisted. “I told you it’d work on him! If it worked on Peterson…” 

“Peterson and Captain America are in different _leagues_ , different universes maybe. To imply that the Centipede program is in any way on par with Erskine’s work would practically be blasphemy. He was a traitor certainly, but one that helped produce the Red Skull.”

Suddenly, Steve felt his insides chill. He redoubled his efforts to throw off whatever chemical paralysis agent was holding him captive. He’d been irritated with himself for getting captured before, mentally reassessing the threat level from ‘harmless’ to ‘okay, I should probably take this seriously’. The mention of Red Skull though… SHIELD had briefed him about the fact that over the past few decades, minor spinoff cults of Hydra had popped up here and there. If these people were some sort of Neo-Hydra, well, the situation just got a lot more serious and a lot more personal. The blonde gritted his teeth (good, he could move that much, then) and forced his muscles to cooperate. He managed to roll to his side, fingers brushing tantalizingly against the edge of his shield. 

Unfortunately, while the scientists weren’t very observant by any means, they didn’t miss him knocking over a cart in his struggles. It fell to the floor with a loud ‘crash’, various chemicals and beakers shattering across the floor noisily. 

“Shit!” the woman swore, before there were two pings against his chest. Steve felt the numbing sensation immediately spread through his body again. 

“Oh no, oh fuck… he’s going to shake off the paralysis. We don’t have any facilities capable of holding him here! He’s just going to throw it off faster and faster,” the chubby man blubbered.

His partner looked to be thinking furiously, jaw clenched and face scrunched up. “What can we do… what can we _do_?” she muttered.

“We have to kill him,” the man burst out.

“No!” she cried. “This could be the greatest opportunity to study the Serum that we could ever ask for. It could advance our work by years… if not decades!”

“Greer, _we can’t hold him!_ ” the man insisted. 

The woman, Greer apparently, had a smug look on her face. “No, _we_ can’t.” she agreed. “We take him to Storage,” she decided definitively. 

“Storage? He’s not prepped for it, and we don’t know how his physiology would respond.”

“We’re not going to Store him,” Greer countered. “We don’t have anything that can hold him… but with him already knocked out… the Soldier can take care of him,” she said.

The man gaped at Greer for a moment, before a relieved grin made its way onto his face. “The Soldier… yeah. Yeah that might just work.”

Greer briskly jogged to the corner of the lab, where a dolly sat, the kind that was used to roll around large boxes. She positioned it next to him. “C’mon, Hawkins, we need to get him down to the escape hatch.”

The escape hatch, sure. Why did all the bad guys have such terrible names for everything? Steve could hear Greer and Hawkins grunting as they struggled to lift him onto the cart. They clearly weren’t used to lugging around 250 pound men. Eventually, they got him mostly situated on it, even though he didn’t fit very well. 

The rolling… well the rolling was _bad_. The combination of the bumpy motion with the experimental chemicals in his system made him so nauseous that it almost made him think fondly of the Rebirth chamber. It was so bad that he blacked out and when he came to, he found himself in what appeared to be the trunk of some kind of vehicle. Steve didn’t know how long he’d been unconscious, but they seemed to be coming to a stop, probably at their destination. He had control over his arms now, and some movement in his legs, but he pretended to be out cold. Best lure Greer and Hawkins into a false sense of security. Steve didn’t think that he had the energy for more than one burst of motion, and he’d have to use it carefully. 

As the door to the trunk opened, he could see Greer through his lashes, and he kept up the pretense of being unconscious. Steve identified her as the more dangerous of the two, and so he lashed out with a roar, falling down on top of her and wrestling her weapon from her grasp. Before he could do much more than register the terror in his eyes, he heard a soft ‘ping’ and felt two more thumps against his back. _Damn it!_ Hawkins had an I.C.E.R. as well! Feeling like an idiot for assuming they’d only had one, Steve pettily hoped that Greer was crushed under his bulk and suffocated or something. Damn Hydra to hell. 

He wasn’t so lucky. Hawkins managed, with Greer’s help, to push him off to the side. “Fuck!” the woman swore, angrily rubbing at her wrist. “He had maybe seventy percent motion after sixty-four minutes? This dose isn’t going to last much longer than a half hour. We need to get him to the Soldier, _now_.” 

Steve felt himself being lifted onto another dolly again, which he dreaded. He couldn’t afford to black out again, but luckily this time the vertigo wasn’t nearly as bad. The scientists were right; his body was processing the paralytics faster and faster. His internal clock said that about five minutes passed before they got to the room they were seeking. Twenty-five minutes left. 

“Do you have the access codes?” Hawkins asked nervously. 

“Yeah, I was on retainer for the 2009 mission. If he’d managed to take out the Widow that would’ve saved us a lot of trouble,” Greer muttered.

Steve ramped the urgency level up to 11 (on a scale of 10). If this ‘Soldier’ was someone capable of posing a threat to Natasha then the situation was even more serious than he’d feared. The paralytic was too fresh though. By ten minutes, he could feel his fingers twitching minutely, but the fluid in the chamber the scientists were messing with was already draining. The Soldier seemed to be kept in some sort of cold storage, and Steve wondered what sort of monster he was going to have to deal with.

“Will he even listen to us,” Hawkins asked fearfully. “We aren’t his handlers.”

“Just shut up and let me do the talking,” Greer hissed back. 

Before long—the twelve minute mark by Steve’s estimation—a man stepped out of the chamber. He was tall, and bulky. There were electrodes attached to his naked chest, and the Captain could see that he was muscular, incredibly so. Even more eye-drawing was the armor that covered his left arm. It appeared to be grafted onto the skin of his shoulder, and there was horrible scarring all down the Soldier’s left side. When the man stepped forward, the plates on his arm popped out a bit and he could hear a whirring sound, almost like the ones his laptop made as it booted up. With a start, Steve realized that the metal wasn’t covering the man’s arm. It _was_ his arm. 

The man’s face was covered by a large breathing mask that hooked behind his ears, obscuring his mouth and nose. His eyes were hidden behind a set of tinted goggles, and the facial gear along with the monstrous arm all came together to make a rather terrifying, inhuman visage. Steve renewed his struggles. He tried to comfort himself with the thought that no matter how bad things were, at least they still wanted him alive. It didn’t work. He’d rather die than give Hydra the secrets of the Serum, willingly or not. 

There was a tense silence in the room while the Soldier analyzed his surroundings, looking around almost lazily. The scientists were practically quivering, and Steve got the feeling that they didn’t have any idea if they could control the man. That was the problem with creating monsters, he though viciously. Eventually they’d turn back towards the hand that held the leash. The metal-armed man’s gaze quickly rested on Greer, probably recognizing that she was in charge.

“What is my mission?” he asked, quietly. His words were muffled by the mask so that Steve could barely understand them. 

Greer and Hawkins looked visibly relieved. “Captain America,” Greer barked shortly, gesturing at his prone form. “We need him alive. Take care of him. Don’t let him out of your sight,” she ordered.

The Soldier turned his gaze to Steve, and he felt a shiver run up his spine. There was something about the way that the other man was studying him that seemed… intent somehow. He didn’t speak for a whole minute (Steve counted the seconds). Hawkins was trembling. “Do you understand?” Greer snapped, an edge of hysteria in her voice.

“My mission is to take care of Captain America.” The Soldier repeated. Greer slumped, expression relaxing. 

“Yes! Yes. That’s your mission. Follow me. We’ll get you to a defensible location.”

The Soldier leaned down and put his metal arm under Steve’s shoulders, and the flesh one beneath his knees, lifting him effortlessly. The Captain swore mentally; the man must be enhanced further than just the metal arm to carry so much weight without a struggle. The four of them (one unwillingly) made their way through the compound. It was awkward being held bridal style by a man who was probably going to torture him, but he’d been in worse situations… maybe. Either way, Steve put his struggles on pause for a bit, not wanting to alert the cyborg to the fact that he wasn’t wholly incapacitated. 

They stopped at a smallish room, maybe ten by ten feet, with a bed, sink, and toilet. It was clearly a prison cell of some sort, but it was also clearly not built to contain someone like Steve. He would doubtlessly be able to escape from it eventually, if not for the Soldier. The cyborg complicated things. The man holding him moved into the room without being ordered, and turned around to face the scientists wordlessly. 

“Right… we’ll just leave you here then,” Greer muttered distractedly. As the door swung shut, he heard the woman say to Hawkins: “Let’s analyze the situation for a little while. No need to alert the Head unnecessarily, after all…”

Twenty three minutes had passed since Steve was hit by the I.C.E.R. when the Soldier placed him on the bed. He was startled; he’d expected to be dropped on the floor or something. Instead, the metal-armed man had set him down almost gingerly, as if he was precious cargo or something. Steve guessed that the man knew the scientists would be upset if he was damaged too much. Good. That gave him an edge. Suddenly, the Soldier reached his metal hand towards Steve’s face. Damn, he hadn’t had enough time! Twenty four minutes and he was still immobile except for twitches along his arms.

The hand got closer and closer to his face. Steve didn’t know if the Soldier was going to suffocate him, or was just trying to torment him by prolonging the movement, but it seemed to take forever for the other man to reach him. Strangely, the brunet just placed the back of his metal palm on Steve’s forehead, lightly. 

There was a pause. He didn’t know what was happening, but it didn’t hurt… As if coming to a realization, the Soldier jerked the metal away, and stared at the limb curiously. (Or at least Steve thought it was curious… it was hard to tell with mask and goggles in the way.) The brunet held his ‘hand’ in front of his face, twisting it around. Was he not aware of the state of his limb? He seemed to shake himself, almost, and then reached for Steve with his flesh arm. The blonde tried to flinch away, but with no success. The Soldier repeated the same motion he made earlier, touching the backs of his fingers lightly to his forehead. It was almost like… almost like the man was checking him for a fever, but that was insane. Maybe not, it was probably valid scientific data of interest to the researchers. 

The Soldier made a strange noise—one that Steve couldn’t recognize through the filter of his mask—and moved to the foot of the bed. He heard a loud ripping sound and quickly deduced that the other man was tearing a strip off the bed sheets. The blonde didn’t understand what the Soldier’s intention was. Did he think that he could bind Steve with such flimsy material? The Soldier walked to the sink and turned it on, wetting the cloth under the flow. Some sort of water torture maybe? Steve had heard about such things, but he couldn’t really imagine they’d be all that effective, despite the evidence to the contrary. 

Upon returning to his side, the other man wrung the scrap out carefully, holding it over his mouth so that the liquid trickled down Steve’s throat. He swallowed greedily, grateful for the fact that he had enough control over his body to do that, at least. The liquid felt like nirvana on his parched throat, and he couldn’t hold back the slight groan of pleasure that escaped him. Steve froze, wondering if that would snap the cyborg out of whatever strange spell he was under, but the man just cocked his head curiously, and returned to the sink, repeating the motions again. If this was supposed to be torture, the brunet was really bad at it. 

The thirty minutes were up, and Steve could feel himself gaining control over his limbs, but he remained still. The other man didn’t seem to be in any rush to hurt him, and he could use all the time he could get in order to be better prepared to fight the Soldier. The Captain analyzed his opponent critically. Without any weapons, and weakened as he was, he wouldn’t stand a chance against the muscular enemy. He had no ideas about the capabilities of the metal arm, and for all he knew it might be able to seriously injure him. The only potential weak points that Steve could spot were the facial adornments. The Soldier hadn’t removed the goggles or mask, and it was possible that they served some sort of vital, life-support function. If he could get to those first, he might just stand a chance. 

Ten minutes passed, and then fifteen. Every two minutes, on the dot, the bulky man would get him another sip of water and lean over him, checking his temperature. Occasionally, he would rearrange one of Steve’s limbs slightly for no reason that the blonde could discern, but the Captain appreciated the fact that it kept him from stiffening up. On the sixteenth minute (forty-sixth post tranquilization) the routine repeated itself again. Steve easily accepted the sip of water, and waited until the Soldier leaned in close to touch his forehead before he made his strike. 

He didn’t bother trying to physically incapacitate the other man, figuring that in his state he’d just flop to the floor or something equally useless. Remaining on the bed, Steve focused all of his energy on darting his hands out, grabbing the mask in his left and the goggles with the right. He tugged as hard as he could, expecting that the gear would be bolted into the guy’s skin or something. Steve fell backwards, surprised at the lack of resistance as the plain bands holding the accessories to the Soldier’s face snapped easily. There were no wires, bolts, electronics, or anything else that would indicate they were vital. Shit. 

Rather than intense scarring or disfiguration, like Steve was expecting, the other man’s face looked almost plain. He had a strong jaw line, covered in stubble. The man’s eyes were surprisingly blue; the blonde had imagined robot eyes, for some reason. There was almost a confused look on his face, like he had no idea why Steve would want to grab the mask and goggles away from him, which made the Captain feel even more foolish, but for some odd reason the Soldier didn’t move to retaliate at all. 

The other man cocked his head to the side curiously (it was a gesture Steve was beginning to assume the Soldier made frequently). Something about the change in position shifted the light across his face in a certain way, or maybe it just broke the blonde out of his battle mode, but either way, Steve suddenly _recognized_ man. He experienced a sensation of vertigo so intense it put his earlier suffering to shame. 

“Bucky?” he asked, disbelieving. The word was out of his mouth before his brain even realized what he was saying. It was like even though he’d recognized the Soldier, he refused to make the connection necessary until it was already said aloud. Steve _knew_ though, with an almost otherworldly certainty, that the man in front of him was his best friend. 

The brunet furrowed his brow in confusion. “Who’s Bucky?” the man responded. 

Hearing him speak without the mask in the way only further confirmed Steve’s suspicions. That was Bucky’s voice, coming from Bucky’s mouth. Almost like he wasn’t in control of his limbs anymore, like the I.C.E.R. took over his body rather than just paralyze it, he felt himself reach out and grab the Soldier’s flesh arm, pulling it towards him. The man allowed himself to be moved, not resisting at all. 

Hands trembling, Steve turned the arm so that it was lying palm up, and ran his fingers over the other man’s wrist. Right where he’d expected it to be was a light brown mark. The blonde had always joked that it was shaped like a dog, which was what made his friend so loyal. Bucky would roll his eyes and insist it was just a blob. The birthmark had faded to the point where it was almost indistinguishable from his skin, and a faint white scar bisected it, but Steve would recognize it anywhere, had joked about it and poked at it and touched it for _years_. 

Steve heard a high-pitched, keening noise. It was kind of annoying actually, and with a start he realized that it was coming from himself. There was a hand on his chest, not pressing down, really; it was firm, stable. His wrist was captured in the other man’s metal arm, cradled to the brunet’s bare chest gently. He was hyperventilating. His lungs were working faster and faster, but it felt like he wasn’t getting any oxygen. It was almost like he had asthma again. 

“Shhh. Breathe. Focus on my breathing. Shh. Breathe…”

Bucky was repeating the mantra over and over, mechanically, as if he wasn’t really sure about what was coming out of his mouth. There was an expression of dismayed panic on his face, but whatever emotions were afflicting him, it didn’t alter his routine whatsoever. The ritual was calming Steve down despite himself. If he closed his eyes, it would almost be like he was back in the forties, with Bucky talking him down from another asthma attack. Slowly, his breathing stabilized. Even after the Serum, it seemed that his body was programmed to respond to Bucky. If he had any doubts at all about the identity of the man in front of him, they were gone now. No one knew about this; Steve had never told anyone about how Bucky would comfort him when things got bad. 

When he was finally able to, Steve took a deep, calming breath before releasing it shakily. Okay. Okay, his best friend was somehow alive, looking the same age that he had seventy years ago. Alright. A year and a half ago he’d fought aliens as they came through a portal in the sky and invaded Manhattan. He could do this. He just had to pull himself together.

“Bucky… why are you here?” Steve blurted, going for the most pertinent question first.

“My mission is to take care of Captain America,” Bucky responded easily. 

“Take care of…” the blond mumbled softly. The other man nodded. When he’d heard Greer use that wording, he’d thought (and she’d probably thought it as well) that the Soldier- that Bucky was supposed to beat him up, or restrain him or something. Instead, his friend was _taking care of him_ , the way that he had innumerable times before, so much so that the motions were likely ingrained deep within his muscle memory. Steve felt his eyes prickle with tears at the thought.

“Are you in pain?” Bucky asked, sounding distressed. 

“No,” Steve responded, quickly. He took a deep breath and pushed aside his tears. He had a job to do. “No, Bucky, I’m fine. It’s okay.” His fingers spasmed a bit against Bucky’s chest. Neither of them had removed their hands from the other’s body. 

Bucky cocked his head, and the palm on his chest retreated. Steve had a moment to feel disappointed before he felt it again, this time running through his hair. The brunet looked almost confused, like he didn’t understand why he would do that. Gathering himself, the Captain slowly moved his free hand up until it rested gently on Bucky’s bicep.

“Bucky, do you remember doing this, before?”

“Before?”

“In Brooklyn? You used to stroke my hair after I had an asthma attack.”

Bucky looked off to the side, as if he was trying to recall the memory, as if he hadn’t done this hundreds of times. Finally, he shook his head. 

Feeling dread pool in the pit of his stomach, Steve asked: “Bucky… what _do_ you remember?”

“My mission is to take care of Captain America,” he replied, obediently. 

The blonde swallowed hard. “And I’m Captain America.”

“Yes,” Bucky nodded, almost excited, as if Steve were a small child who was finally beginning to comprehend something that was not at all a difficult concept to grasp. 

“My name is Steve. Call me Steve.”

Bucky tilted his head to the side before nodding. “Steve,” he repeated obligingly. 

“Yeah, that’s right,” the blonde said encouragingly. The other man still had his wrist caught gently in his metal grasp, but there was enough room for Steve to pat at his friend’s chest a little bit. Once he did so, he grimaced at the feel of something a bit slimy. The Storage chamber had seemed like it had a rinse cycle to wash off whatever chemicals Hydra was using to preserve Bucky, but it wasn’t perfect. “We should… we should get you clean,” he muttered, distracted. Steve stood up suddenly, wobbling a bit and his friend let go of his wrist, moving the hand to his hip to steady him. 

“Cleanliness is not critical to the mission imperative,” Bucky intoned stubbornly. 

Steve ripped off a corner of the sheet, moving to the sink. “Yes it is,” he countered. “Come here.”

Bucky did as told, moving so that he was standing stoically beside him. Steve wet the cloth under the sink, and gently brought it to the other man’s skin, wiping slowly at the gummy spot on his chest. He felt like breaking something—or maybe someone—every time he came across a scar that he didn’t recognize (which was often). Steve distracted himself by thinking about it like a mission. He had to get Bucky clean, no time for frivolous thoughts. It was by no means the first time that he’d washed Bucky, and the familiar motions were soothing a bit, one of his hands rested on the man’s hip while the other moved carefully over his torso. Finally, hesitantly, he moved to the angry, red scarred flesh that served as the boundary between skin and metal. Steve dabbed at it a little. Bucky didn’t even flinch.

“Does that hurt?” Steve asked.

“Pain is within tolerable levels.”

The blonde clenched his jaw angrily. “No, there are no tolerable levels for pain. The only acceptable pain level is zero, okay?” Once Bucky nodded hesitantly, he asked again. “Are you in pain?”

The other man looked confused, working his jaw a bit. “Pain is… not incapacitating?” he tried.

Steve sighed. “On a scale of one to ten—ten being the worst pain you’ve ever felt and one being the least—how would you rate what you’re feeling right now?”

“One,” Bucky replied immediately. 

The blonde sagged a bit. “Okay, good. That’s good. Um. Go ahead and turn around so I can get your back.”

It should have been torturous, running a thin cloth all over Bucky’s body, but there was nothing that killed his libido faster than seeing the mess that Hydra had made of him. He silently cataloged the scars, burn marks, even gunshot wounds, swearing to match each one blow for blow on this newfangled neo-Hydra cell. 

Suddenly, the door to the room slammed open, revealing Greer, standing with an I.C.E.R. held out in front of her. She looked panicked. “Soldier! What are you doing?” the woman cried.

“My mission.”

“You mission was to incapacitate the Captain!” Greer said hysterically.

Bucky shook his head. “My mission is to take care of Steve.”

“Oh shit… um… Redefine mission parameters: incapacitate Captain America.”

“Mission parameter redefinition rejected,” Bucky growled, scowling. 

Steve couldn’t take this anymore. The odds were stacked ridiculously in their favor now. It was two super soldiers against two untrained scientists. “Greer, if you surrender, I might be able to guarantee that you make it to a SHIELD holding cell in one piece.” Maybe. Probably not. He didn’t think he’d ever hated anyone as much as he hated that woman right now, and that was counting the Red Skull and Hitler. Steve stared her down, giving her his best ‘Captain America’ glare and took a step closer. 

“Fuck you,” she snarled, firing off two rounds of her weapon. Everything happened all at once; Steve found himself sprawled on the floor, pushed down by Bucky. The other man’s metal arm snapped forward swiftly, and the I.C.E.R. rounds splattered harmlessly against it. Before he could even blink, Bucky moved forward and crushed the muzzle of the gun with his fist, shoving Greer out of the room.

“You are a threat to my mission.” The words were _almost_ toneless, but Steve could recognize the hint of anger in his friend’s voice. 

Greer immediately turned heel and ran as if her life depended on it, which it very well could. Bucky took a step forward, but then suddenly stopped himself and turned back to look at Steve. The other man grabbed the door handle and shut it firmly. Gathering his wits, the blonde stood up and beamed at his friend. “Wow! That was great, Buck. Good job!”

The corners of Bucky’s mouth twitched, before he seemed to take control of himself. “Have to take care of you,” he mumbled, almost embarrassed. 

“Yeah, you took care of me just fine,” Steve praised. “Come on! Now’s our chance to escape.”

“No.” Bucky looked distressed. 

“No?” Steve repeated dumbly. “Bucky, they’re going to call for reinforcements. We need to leave before that.”

“No! Mission: take care of Captain America. Don’t let him out of your sight.”

“You’re doing a great job of taking care of me, buddy, really. But I’m going to be in danger if we don’t leave,” Steve insisted, putting a hand on Bucky’s elbow. 

“Don’t let him out of your sight,” the other man repeated desperately. 

Steve let out an audible breath of air, relieved. “Oh, yeah. You’re definitely coming with me too! I don’t have to be out of your sight at all.”

Bucky looked agonized. “Improper validation codes to leave compound,” he said mournfully. 

“Improper… Are you saying you can’t leave?”

“Validation codes required to exit compound. Punishment: termination.”

“Termination?” Steve parroted dumbly. He glanced down at Bucky’s metal arm. “Is there some sort of… kill switch in there?”

Bucky just shrugged. “Punishment: termination,” he repeated. 

Shit. Well, there was no way that he was going to force Bucky to leave if there was even the slightest chance that his friend would be killed. Steve couldn’t leave either; there was no way he was going to abandon the brunet to Hydra. Still, there was the issue of getting out before reinforcements arrived. Actually…

“Bucky, if Greer goes and calls in backup… someone to get you back under their control, do you think that they’d know the validation codes for leaving base?” Steve asked, excited. 

“Probability high,” Bucky confirmed. 

Steve glanced around the room frantically. Yes! Greer and Hawkins were by no means qualified for this; they’d left him his shield. The blonde grinned, and grabbed it off the ground. He fiddled with the handle for a bit before feeling the distinctive ‘click’ of the tracking device embedded in it. The tiny machine would emit a distress signal of some sort, or so he’d been told. SHIELD would know that he was missing by now, and they might be able to send a backup team to his location before Hydra could. Steve shoved his shield under the bed. It wasn’t the best hiding spot but it was at least obscured from immediate view. 

“Alright, we’ll just… wait here for a bit then. Best case scenario, my friends come and break us out, worst case, we wait until we can get a validation code from a Hydra lackey and break ourselves out.” In the meantime, Steve hopped up on the bed and pressed himself against the wall, resting his ear against the vent. He could hear voices being carried through the air shaft. Jackpot. Bucky rested his hands against the blonde’s hips to steady him. Steve appreciated the thought.

“Sir!” he heard Greer beg, panicked. “The situation is completely out of hand. The Winter Soldier tried to kill me!”

“I very much doubt that,” a tinny voice replied, like it was being transmitted through a video screen. “Considering that you’re still alive. If the asset wanted you dead, then we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Go over everything that happened since you unfroze him.”

“Yes sir,” Greer whimpered. “The decontainment process went off without any problems. He stepped out of the tube and asked what his mission was.”

“And what did you say?”

“I told him that we needed the Captain alive. I said that he needed to take care of him,” responded the woman.

“Hm,” the voice mused shortly. “Take care of him? Yes, you must be careful to be very literal and specific with him. He doesn’t have the programming to deal with colloquialisms like that. Of course, I didn’t think that he had the programming to do this kind of task either, but maybe it’s a remnant of the days that he was assigned guard missions. It’s no matter. He seems stable?”

“The…. The asset- If he thinks that his mission is to protect Rogers, then he’s acting within mission parameters, yes,” replied Greer shakily. 

“Good, that means he’s not breaking down. I’ll have to come up myself though, to ensure that there are no more mistakes of this nature.” It sounded like a threat, and given the sharp inhalation Steve heard, he had no doubt that Greer knew it, too.

“What should we do in the meantime, sir? If the asset is following the Captain’s orders, it’s only a matter of time before they escape.”

“The Captain was fully conscious when you entered the room?”

“Yes,” answered Greer.

“If he’s regained control of his body and he hasn’t escaped yet, then there must be a reason. Hm, very interesting. I had my suspicions about the Soldier, of course, but this likely confirms them,” mused the voice.

“Sir?”

“It’s none of your concern. If the Captain hasn’t left yet, then it’s likely that he won’t for now. The Soldier is holding him there, in a way. We may be able to salvage this mess after all. I’ll send some troops to your location to keep it secure.”

“But, I thought you were going to come yourself?” asked Greer.

“Unfortunately, due to the nature of my… public life, I have engagements that I can’t simply rearrange. I will be there in… hm, two days’ time. Do try to keep things under control, there,” the man said, with a pleasantness to his voice that made him sound even more threatening. “I would hate for any more unpleasantness to occur.”

“Yes… yes sir.”

Hearing the distinctive ‘click’ of a screen being shut off, Steve backed up from the wall. Wordlessly, he stepped down off the bed and gathered his shield from underneath it, flicking the tracking device off.

“Steve?” Bucky questioned curiously. 

“That guy… he sounded like the boss. If he’s coming here then I’m going to let him. Maybe we can capture him and nip this neo-Hydra cell in the bud.”

Bucky cocked his head and moved closer, until he was just a few inches from Steve. The blonde smiled at him curiously. “Bucky?” he asked softly, but then he squawked awkwardly as he was pushed down on the bed, limbs flailing. 

“Resting is important for functioning at optimum efficiency,” the man said with a nod, sounding pleased with himself. Bucky placed a hand on the blonde’s chest, pinning him down. “Steve should rest.”

The Captain chuckled, wrapping his fingers loosely around Bucky’s wrist. “Sure, sure. We’re just going to wait here anyway. Might as well get some sleep before we’ve got Hydra goons all over the place.”

Bucky shook his head. “You rest. I’ll keep watch. Take care of you.”

Steve frowned. “Isn’t it important for you to, uh… function at optimum efficiency?” 

“Fatigue is within acceptable levels.”

The blonde sighed. “Right, well, there’s nothing here that poses a threat right now…” He paused, before squirming up the bed until he sat with his back against the wall. “Actually, protecting me is a good idea. Why don’t you come and sit down in front of me so that you can shield me if someone tries to come through the door?”

Bucky cocked his head. “This strategy is acceptable,” he confirmed, climbing onto the bed. Steve rearranged him gently so that his friend sat between his legs. The blonde wrapped his arms loosely around the other man’s middle. 

“Scoot down a little bit, okay?” Eventually, they got themselves situated so that Bucky’s head was leaning against his shoulder, and Steve’s arms were wrapped around him, holding him to his body. The brunet’s flesh hand grasped his wrist lightly.

“You know,” Steve began. “Your eyes will dry out if you keep them open… maybe you should try shutting them for a bit so that you can maintain optimum efficiency when the other troops are here.”

“Can’t let you out of my sight,” refuted Bucky. 

Right. What was it that Greer had tried? “Uh, redefine mission parameters? Letting me out of sight is acceptable?”

“Rejected,” scowled the brunet. Steve’s breath caught in his throat for a moment. The stubborn look on Bucky’s face, the set of his jaw… that wasn’t the Winter Soldier; that expression was all Bucky. It was how his friend would look every time Steve did something stupid. He bit his lip; his friend was still in there somewhere, buried underneath the Soldier. 

“Alright,” Steve agreed. His voice sounded thick with emotion, so he cleared his throat and tried again. “Alright, redefine mission parameters: don’t let me out of your sight means don’t let me out of your perception. As long as you can hear or feel me, it’s okay not to see me.”

Bucky frowned, but seemed to be thinking about it. “Confirmed,” he said reluctantly. Steve sighed, relieved. 

“Confirmed. Great. Okay, why don’t you close your eyes for a bit? Keep them from watering up.” 

The man shot him one last glance before doing as he was told. Steve gently stroked a hand up and down his right side, trying to soothe him into sleeping. “You know, this reminds me of being back in Brooklyn,” he murmured. “We used to sleep like this a lot, except the other way around. You’d’ve crushed me back then; I was too small.”

“You were smaller?” muttered Bucky.

“Yeah Buck, I was smaller. And I was sick a lot. Sometimes, when things got bad I had to sleep sitting up, for my lungs, and you’d prop me up against your chest just like this, hold me until I went to sleep.”

“I took care of you?”

“Yeah Bucky. You took real good care of me, the best.” Steve had to swallow thickly to keep himself under control. 

“Am I Bucky?” his friend asked, suddenly. 

Steve felt like someone reached into his chest and was squeezing his heart. “Yeah,” he whispered hoarsely. “Sorry, I should’ve told you that first. You’re Bucky. James Buchannan Barnes, actually, but there were five Jameses on our block, and you wanted to be different, so you started calling yourself Bucky. Drove your Ma crazy at first. Her name was Winifred, but she called herself Fred, so maybe she should’ve saw the whole nickname thing coming. Uh, your dad’s name was George, and you had a little sister named Becca, too.”

Bucky shifted, twisting his head to the side so that his nose was pressing into Steve’s neck. He leaned his cheek against the crown of the other man’s head. “Uh, we were six when we first met each other. You protected me from some bullies.”

“Took care’a you,” Bucky mumbled. 

“That’s right. You took care of me.” Steve felt his eyelids dropping. He’d been way overdosed with paralytics, and it was taking its toll on him. The stress of the day was catching up to him. “Kind of like the time when Jack Goodson cornered me at school…” he softly murmured as many stories as he could remember, before slowly drifting off…

~

Steve woke up suddenly as Bucky ripped himself from his grasp, crouching on the floor in a defensive position. A moment later, the door to the cell opened. This time, it wasn’t Greer or Hawkins, but rather a large man in a tactical suit. He had an assault rifle slung across his back, but even so Steve couldn’t help but think that he looked intimidated at the sight of Bucky snarling.

“Breakfast,” the man said shortly, and Steve realized that he had a tray in his hands. Slowly, the soldier leaned down and placed in on the floor, before backing carefully from the room.

Bucky’s eyes remained trained on the closed door. “We must’ve slept through the night,” Steve mused. 

Bucky shook his head. “Steve slept nine point five hours. The asset maintained two ninety-minute sleep cycles, as necessary for optimum performance.”

The blond sighed. “Okay… good.” Nine and a half hours, huh? He’d rarely slept so well since waking up in the future. No wonder he felt so rested. “Well, we better chow down then.” There was a chance that the food was drugged, but he couldn’t exactly go two days without eating anything and then expect to be in fighting shape. Even if it was drugged, he should recover by the next day. 

Steve got out of bed and approached the tray. He’d been expecting prison food, or an MRE, but surprisingly the tray contained a decent looking sandwich and an apple. The blonde felt his stomach gurgling. “Alright, let’s split the sandwich in half and take turns having bites of the apple.”

“Hunger is within-” 

“Acceptable levels, got it,” Steve interrupted with a sigh. The next time anyone (other than Bucky) said ‘acceptable levels’ he’d sock them in the jaw. Quickly realizing that this was a fight he wasn’t going to win, the blonde stood up and knocked on the door firmly. Bucky hissed at him and dragged him backwards, but a voice called out from the other side.

“What?”

“Bu- The Soldier needs food too,” Steve said firmly. There was a pause for a while, before the door opened again, and another tray slid through the opening before it shut again. Bucky was scowling at him, probably mad at him for provoking the guards, but Steve just smiled. “Chow time,” he said brightly. 

Bucky grumbled a bit but didn’t protest when Steve deposited the second tray into his hands. The two of them quickly polished off the food they’d been given. “Hey, these sandwiches are pretty good, huh Bucky?”

“Pretty good,” the brunet repeated affirmatively. 

“Much better than the MREs they fed us back in the war. Oh boy, those things were _terrible_. Course, food’s a lot better now than it was when we were growing up. We used to boil everything: meat, potatoes, you name it.”

“Turnips,” Bucky supplied, and then looked surprised at himself.

“Yeah!” Steve beamed. “You remember that?”

Bucky shook his head. “I don’t… I don’t know what that is.”

“Oh, a turnip is a plant, a vegetable. We used to boil them all the time. They were pretty cheap and they’d give some substance to a stew.” Steve felt hope bubbling up in his chest. Some part of Bucky had remembered that, even if it wasn’t conscious. Maybe he could get the rest back, in time. 

“Hey, I have an idea! We’re just waiting here, wasting time, why don’t we play a game?”

“Game?” Bucky repeated blankly.

“Yeah, something to do for fun, to pass the time.”

Bucky shrugged, but that didn’t deter Steve at all. “How about…” he began. “What if I told you some stories, and you try to guess what happens next in them?”

“I don’t remember,” he protested.

“I’m not saying you have to remember,” Steve insisted gently. “Just… guess. That’s what makes it a game.”

Bucky looked skeptical but then shrugged. Steve smiled at him. 

“Hm… let’s see… Oh! Okay, there was this time, back when we were… eighteen, I think. We were going to go out dancing, but I couldn’t get a date. I was pretty scrawny back then; girls weren’t interested in hanging around me too much. You were able to find one for yourself, but her friend wasn’t willing to go out with me. You ditched her without a second glance. Told her that you had to look after me and make sure that I didn’t get into any trouble. Do you reme- What do you think you said to me?”

Bucky furrowed his brow for a long moment, thinking. Finally he looked up at Steve. “Dancing… is not required for optimum performance?” he tried tentatively.

Steve chuckled and rubbed at the back of his head. “Actually, that’s not too far off. You said ‘Stevie, you don’t need them anyhow. That girl don’t know what she’s missing.’ And we went home instead of dancing.”

“Stevie?”

“You used to call me that sometimes. It’s a nickname, like Bucky.”

“Stevie… Steve.” Bucky’s face cleared. “You should be in bed,” he said suddenly, mulish expression on his face. 

“Alright, sure,” Steve agreed easily. There was nowhere else in the cell to sit anyways. He lounged on the cot, and patted the spot next to him. Bucky sat down as well. “Do you want to try some more stories?”

For the next few hours, Steve spoke until his voice was sore. He had a lifetime of memories to share with Bucky, and it seemed like telling one made him thinking of dozens more. He tried to keep it light at first, but it seemed dishonest to ignore things about the Depression, or the War. Besides, there was no guarantee that the happier memories would help Bucky remember any more than the sad ones. He tried not to be discouraged at the strange, mechanical answers his friend gave. Every once in a while, Bucky would say something that was almost correct, just skewed by his odd way of speaking. 

“Sleep is required for optimum performance.”

“That’s right!” Steve beamed. “You told me to get some rest. Put me to bed like you did last night.”

Bucky smiled back shyly, like he wasn’t sure if the expression was okay to make. The blonde just tried to widen his grin even more, to show his friend that it was alright. The brunet ducked his head a bit in embarrassment. They’d just finished lunch, and Steve was finally starting to feel recovered from his queasiness from the day prior. No one disturbed them except to bring in meals, although Steve was sure that they were being observed in some way. 

“Alright, let’s think up another one… Huh. What about when we were eleven. There was this girl I liked, prettiest girl in the class. She was real nice, too, but it must have been embarrassing for her to have to turn me down. What was her name again? Pretty sure it was Sandra May-”

“Sally May,” Bucky interjected.

“Hm?”

“Sally May,” he repeated, insistently.

Steve stared at him for a moment. “Yeah… her name was Sally, not Sandra. I’d forgotten,” he said slowly. Bucky was looking off to the side, staring blankly at a spot behind Steve’s shoulder. His eyes were almost glazed over. 

“She had… she had pig tails. And a red dress.”

Steve remembered the pig tails, but not the dress. His mouth felt dry, and he doubted that it had anything to do with all the talking he’d been doing. Suddenly, Bucky’s eyes snapped to him. There was a strange desperation in his gaze, even though his eyes were still a bit cloudy. “Are you… Are you _Steve_?” he asked, fingers digging into Steve’s thigh.

“I- I am Bucky. I’m Steve. Do you remember me?” he asked, hoarse.

“But… you were small. You’re supposed to be smaller,” insisted the brunet.

Explaining the serum seemed too complicated right now. “I grew up,” Steve said gently, carefully touching his hand to the side of Bucky’s face, cradling his cheek. “You used to be smaller too. Always bigger than me, sure, but not nearly as huge as you are now,” he joked lightly, smiling a bit. It felt a little watery. “That’s what happens to children; they grow up.”

“I was a child?” Bucky asked, sounding lost.

Steve pressed his hand a bit more firmly into his friend’s cheek, stroking the man’s face with his thumb. “Yeah, buddy. You were a child once, and a teenager, and an adult- with me. You’ve been in all my stories. The Bucky in all of them… that was _you_.”

“I was the boy who protected you from the bullies,” Bucky said slowly. Steve nodded encouragingly. “And brought you soup when you were sick?”

“That’s right,” the Captain agreed. 

“And you’re the blonde boy, the little one?”

“Well, I’m not so little anymore, but yes.”

Something finally cleared up in Bucky’s face. His flesh arm rose to Steve’s face, cupping his cheek in a mirror of the blonde’s hand. “My mission was to take care of you,” he said suddenly.

“Yes Bucky,” he agreed, swallowing thickly. “Your mission has always been to take care of me.”

The brunet leaned in slowly, gradually, until finally their foreheads touched. Bucky looked into his eyes. The two of them sat there for a long while, just breathing and feeling each other. Steve tried to get his emotions under control. He wasn’t sure how successful he was. “My mission is to take care of you too, Bucky,” the blonde whispered. “I’m going to get you out of here. I’m going to make sure you’re safe, and you’re going to get the happy ending you deserve. I don’t know how this happened, how we ended up here, but this is a miracle. The bad stuff doesn’t matter ‘cause I’m going to make everything else good from here on out.”

Bucky stared at him for a bit, silently, before leaning in even more. He breached the last few inches between them, touching his lips to Steve’s. The kiss was barely more than a brush of skin, and lasted only an instant before the brunet pulled back. 

“Do you remember doing that?” Steve whispered once Bucky had retreated.

The other man shook his head. “Not… not like a real memory. My body just knew.”

Steve chuckled, because he felt like if he didn’t laugh then he was going to cry. Even after all these decades, after whatever torture Hydra had put him through… whatever they did to wipe his mind, Bucky’s body still remembered his. “Yeah… my body remembers yours too. We’re going to get out of here, Bucky, I swear it.”

Even if he had to tear down the entire neo-Hydra operation with his bare hands, nothing would keep him from saving Bucky. 

~

“Breakfast,” the guard announced gruffly, the next day.

Neither he nor Bucky had been as fortunate with regards to sleep last night as they were the night before. The brunet had the beginnings of dark bags under his eyes and Steve was certain that his face looked the same. Ever since his breakthrough the day before, Bucky’s memories had been returning faster and faster. At first, they’d just been fragments, half-there things prompted by Steve’s stories. They’d played the ‘guessing game’ for a while, and soon enough the brunet had been filling in details that even he didn’t remember. The other man was by no means the Bucky that he remembered, but the little pieces were starting to fill themselves in. 

Throughout the night, however, his friend had started remembering things unprompted. It seemed like the majority of his most easily accessible memories were awful, too. Bucky told him about being tortured and beaten, about killing people for Hydra. It made Steve sick to his stomach. Needless to say, they hadn’t gotten very much sleep.

They wouldn’t have to endure this much longer though. The boss was coming soon enough, and then this farce could end. Steve slipped his shield onto his arm, no longer bothering with stealth. It would serve its purpose even if they took it from him. He and Bucky didn’t speak much; the other man looked disturbed though. Steve hoped he wasn’t reliving any bad memories. He slipped his hand into his friend’s and squeezed lightly. Bucky squeezed back.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity but couldn’t have been more than an hour or two, the door opened again. A man walked inside, exuding the kind of confidence that Steve was accustomed to seeing from Generals or other high ranking diplomats. There was no doubt that this man was in charge of the operation. He was maybe in his sixties, with light blonde hair that hadn’t yet started to gray. His face was adorned by a set of large glasses that made him look more distinguished. Steve tightened his grip on the straps of his shield.

The man glanced around for a moment before looking startled. “Has the Soldier been half naked this entire time? Samuels!” he called back out of the room. “Get the man a shirt, and bring a few chairs in as well.” He turned to Steve with a pleasant smile on his face. “So sorry about that. I’ve found that it’s quite difficult to get good help nowadays. Please, forgive me for the unpleasantness. I hope the food at least was to your liking.”

Steve regarded the man warily. The bad guys who wanted you to get along them were sometimes worse than the straightforward ones. At least you knew when the latter were going to stab you in the back. “It was alright,” he said finally. “May I ask whom I’m speaking to?”

The older blonde started, shaking his head in embarrassment. “Oh, where are my manners? My name is Alexander Pierce.” The man held out his right hand to shake, but Steve just stared at it.

“Pierce, like the Secretary of Defense?” he asked, dumbfounded. Was this man Hydra?

Pierce dropped his hand but not his pleasant expression. If anything his smile grew larger. “Oh, you’ve heard of me! I’m very glad. I’ve heard quite a bit about you as well, Captain. It’s my pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Steve clenched his jaw. “I’m afraid to say the pleasure is all yours, Secretary.”

That just seemed to amuse the man further. “Good one!” Pierce laughed. “Fury did tell me you were witty, but I suppose I couldn’t quite get past my preconceived notions of Captain America, you know?” 

Before he could answer, the door opened again, and the items Pierce asked for were delivered. The Secretary grabbed the shirt from Samuels’ hands and tossed it to Bucky. “Go ahead and put that on, Solider.”

Mechanically, Bucky did as ordered. He looked distressed. Steve’s expression grew flintier at the realization that his friend must be acquainted with the man in front of them. “Please, take a seat,” smiled Pierce.

“I’d rather stand, actually,” Steve replied stiffly.

“Sure,” the man said easily. “If it’s all the same to you, though, I think I’ll take the chair. My old bones aren’t the same as they used to be!”

He had to hand it to the guy. He was so inoffensive that Steve had to work to keep up his defenses. That just made him all the more dangerous.

“You know, Captain Rogers, I’ve always been a huge fan of your work. Nothing impresses me more than someone as competent as you.”

“I’m kind of surprised you’d say that, given the fact that my ‘competence’ as you call it led to me destroying your organization once before,” Steve countered. 

Pierce grinned sheepishly. “Oh, so you know about the Hydra thing, then?”

The Captain paused, narrowing his eyes. “You don’t deny it?”

“Why should I deny it? It’s the truth, after all. The thing is, though, Hydra’s just a name. I very much understand why you’d be startled to hear it. Trust me! In your shoes I have no doubt I’d feel the same way. Things are different now though. Names mean different things than they did seventy years ago.”

“You’re trying to tell me that Hydra’s not evil anymore?” Steve asked skeptically. Was this guy for real?

“Yes that’s exactly what I’m trying to tell you,” Pierce smiled. “Take socialism, for example. I have it on good authority that you were a member of the Socialist Worker’s Party before you joined the army, is that not correct?”

Steve blinked. “How do you know about that? I thought that the government wiped those records in the fifties?”

“I have _very_ good people working for me,” Pierced murmured with a smirk. “So you were a socialist. And as I’m sure you know, the most prominent socialist country, the USSR, was the United States’ greatest enemy for decades. They almost destroyed the entire world with their insistence upon nuclear proliferation. And then the USSR fell, and now socialism is all the rage in West Europe. Look at Scandinavia! They’re doing fantastic things with socialism.” Pierce leaned forward, gazing at him intently. “That’s because Socialism is just a word, a name. What _matters_ is the people behind it, their goals and their intentions.”

“And you expect me to believe that Hydra, what? Is all about a noble cause?”

“As a matter of fact, yes I do. I’m sure that you’re familiar with the motto of Hydra: cut off one head, two more grow in its place?”

Steve shuddered in revulsion, clenching his fists.

“Ah, I can see that you are. Like I said, I understand why it is that you’re angry. However, our organization isn’t affiliated with the Red Skull or his ideals. We believe that the world is fundamentally broken. It’s full of strife, hunger, rape, war, murder… you name it! Even America, the so-called home of the free, spies on its own citizens, jailing them at a rate higher than any other country on the globe! Does this seem like the world you imagined? Is this the world you gave your life for?”

Steve stayed silent. The worst part of Pierce’s speech was that he was right. This _wasn’t_ the kind of world that Steve had hoped for. The Secretary gave him a knowing look. “No, I didn’t think so,” he said triumphantly. “That is why we took the name Hydra. We want to cut off the lazy, self-serving, corrupt heads of this world and in their places grow order, law, and _peace_. Our goals aren’t so different from your own!”

Steve shook his head. “You can preach at me all you want, but that doesn’t change what you’ve done to Bucky. No organization that claims to be ‘good’ would torture and brainwash an innocent man.”

Pierce looked surprised. “Torture? You think that _I_ did that? Oh my friend, you’re operating under a grave misconception. It was SHIELD that did this to Bucky.”

Steve barked out a bitter laugh. “Right, try pulling the other one.”

The Secretary reached into his jacket, and Steve tensed up, ready for combat. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Bucky do the same. Pierce’s hand froze, but he grinned, and pulled out a manila envelope, the kind that Steve had seen around the offices of SHIELD. “Just a folder, Captain. Nothing threatening here.” The man cracked open the file and fingered through a few papers, before humming happily and pulling one out. “The first thing you need to know about is Operation Paperclip, where SHIELD authorized the seizure and nationalization of Nazi—and Hydra—scientists, one of whom you’re quite familiar with… Arnim Zola?”

The Captain froze. “You’re lying,” he said quietly. 

“Read the form. Everything’s there. I think you’ll also find the signature at the bottom quite interesting as well.” Pierce handed the paper over and Steve took it, scanning its contents. It was an official SHIELD memo, authorizing the transfer and freedom of Arnim Zola, provided he work for them as long as he lived. At the bottom of the paper were two signatures: Howard Stark and Peggy Carter. He felt like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water into his veins, but he cleared his head quickly. Everything looked legitimate, but that didn’t mean anything. Steve needed to focus on the situation at hand. 

“What does this have to do with Bucky,” Steve gritted out. 

“My good man, what exactly is it that you think Zola _did_ for SHIELD? What was Zola’s greatest ambition, his greatest work?”

With horror, Steve glanced to his side, where his best friend stood stoically. “Bucky,” he whispered. “He was trying to recreate the Serum.” Unbidden, his mind flashed to an image of Bucky, strapped to the operating table in Austria. 

“That’s right,” Pierce confirmed, pulling another paper out of the file. “Here’s the authorization that Howard Stark and Peggy Carter gave to Zola, giving him permission to test his results on human prisoners.”

Numbly, Steve accepted the paper, seeing the damning signatures on the bottom of the page. “It doesn’t say Bucky’s name here anywhere,” he protested weakly.

“No, it doesn’t,” Pierce agreed. “But does that change anything? Carter and Stark may or may not have known that they were signing off on Barnes’ torture, but either way they were approving it for _someone_. Plus, we know for a fact that SHIELD was using him for missions for decades, cryogenically freezing him in between them to preserve his usefulness. SHIELD is just as corrupt as every other power out there.”

Steve took a deep breath. “If SHIELD did this to Bucky, then why was he in _your_ storage facility?”

“My organization has been infiltrating SHIELD for decades,” Pierce answered. “I started out as a SHIELD agent. Eventually we were able to fake his death, and smuggle him out of their control. At first, my superiors wanted to use him as a weapon against them. He was activated for one mission in 2009, but we saw that it was too cruel. We didn’t have the resources to help him, and so we’ve kept him on ice ever since, hoping that when we reached our goals we’d be able to get him the care that he needed.”

“Why should I believe you?” he asked, but Steve knew it was futile. The doubt was already starting to worm into his mind. If Pierce’s expression was anything to go by, the other man knew it too.

“You’re right to be suspicious. I could be lying to you. These documents could be forgeries. The fact remains though, that I could’ve killed you at any time. I could’ve had my men shoot automatic rounds into this room, or bomb the building from afar… but I didn’t. My people incapacitated you, acting in self-defense, and ever since I was alerted to the situation I’ve treated you with every comfort I could afford you. I can promise you that SHIELD wouldn’t do the same. Think about Barton.”

“Barton?”

“You don’t think it’s suspicious? The man was possessed by Loki, kills SHIELD agents, and then disappears as soon as he’s not needed anymore?”

Steve shook his head. “He’s in the country, convalescing. He needed time after everything that happened to him.”

“That’s what they told you, sure. Did they give you any proof? Pictures, videos, even a damn post card?”

“I never asked,” Steve protested weakly. 

“They killed him! Their own man and they killed him,” Pierce snapped. “Or worse. Maybe right now they’re torturing him, keeping him hostage… Doing to him what they did to your friend!” The Secretary gestured to Bucky. “SHIELD isn’t going to help Bucky, Steve. They’ll kill him, do anything to protect their secrets and their power. That’s how SHIELD operates. But my organization… we’ll do everything we can to make sure that he gets better. We can release him into your custody, give you every resource that we can spare. All you have to do is work with us to end SHIELD’s tyranny!”

“I… I don’t…” Steve’s head was swimming. His heart was telling him not to trust Pierce. How could Hydra possibly be good? But, sickeningly, it made _sense_. SHIELD’s experiments with the tesseract—trying to make weapons, no less—had been what had allowed Loki to endanger the entire world. Their lust for power had almost gotten Earth conquered by aliens. How many times had Steve felt uncomfortable with the shadowy, secretive nature of SHIELD?

“Please Steve,” Pierce begged. “Let me help you. We can do so much together. We can save the world!”

Before he could make his decision, the roof caved in on them. Steve could feel the entire compound shaking, accompanied by the familiar roar of the Hulk. Through the hole in the roof descended a red and gold clad figure, Iron Man. “Hey there Cap!” Tony said cheerfully. “Looks like you can use a hand.”

During the explosion, Bucky had grabbed him and threw him to the floor, hovering over his body protectively. Stark was pointing his repulsors at Pierce and ignoring the metal-armed man for now. Steve figured that Iron Man guessed Bucky was on his side. “Steve!” Pierce cried. “Now’s your last chance! You have to believe me. SHIELD will kill you and Bucky if they find out what you know!”

“Huh, Bucky? What’s he talking about?” Tony asked.

Bucky was standing over him, face obscured by his hair. There was no doubt that Stark didn’t recognize the man. Steve ignored him. He didn’t know what to do. All his life, fighting his enemies had been an easy choice. Bullies, Nazis, Aliens… they were all the same. It was clear who the bad guys were. Now… he had no clue whose side to choose. In the end, though, he couldn’t gamble with Bucky’s life. Steve stood up, pulling Bucky with him. 

“I’m sorry,” he said to Tony, before throwing his shield, aiming for the arc reactor. Now that it wasn’t encased in Stark’s body, he might be able to knock it loose and disable the whole suit. Iron Man froze, surprised by the attack. Before the shield could reach him though, it was knocked out of the air by an arrow.

“Rogers, what the hell!” cried a voice from the roof. 

“Hawkeye,” Steve breathed. If he was here, that meant…

“You lied to me!” he roared, running to Pierce and slamming him up against the wall. 

“Uh, guys… is Cap good or bad?”

Steve ignored him, again. “Was any of it true? Anything.” Pierce just sneered at him, so Steve shook him, slamming him up against the wall again. “Answer me!”

“Hail Hydra,” Pierce spat. “Asset! Activation code alpha seven seven three delta epsilon. Kill the Avengers!”

“Shit!” Steve swore, throwing the man into the wall to the side of them. He watched Pierce crumple with a vicious stab of pleasure. The Captain turned to Bucky. His friend was staring at him wide eyed, trembling. 

“Cap should we take him out?” Tony asked.

“No!” Steve called. “Just… back up. Give me a second.” 

He approached Bucky slowly, hands held out, palms facing forward. “Bucky… are you alright?”

The other man backed up a step. “You’re an Avenger?”

Steve winced. “Yeah… Yeah I am, Buck, but we don’t have to fight,” he pleaded. 

“Activation codes authorized. My mission is to kill the Avengers,” Bucky said, swallowing heavily. His right hand was trembling. “I have to complete my mission,” he whispered.

“Your mission is to protect me, remember? You said it yourself. You mission is and has always been to take care of me.”

Steve stepped closer, and Bucky stepped back against the wall. Slowly, he approached until he was within arms distance of the other man. Bucky didn’t make any move to attack him, but he was tense. The brunet was so tense that Steve thought he might snap at any second. He reached out and gently brushed his hands against Bucky’s face. 

“My mission…” he protested, voice quivering. 

“You’ve gotta decide, Buck,” Steve breathed. “I can’t fight you. I won’t.” Steve took Bucky’s metal hand and placed it on his neck. Bucky didn’t resist. “You’ve got two missions, now, and you’ve gotta figure out which one you’re going to follow. Kill me or save me, it’s your choice. Either way, I’m with you ‘til the end of the line.”

Bucky’s metal hand whirred, and slowly moved forward so that his fingers were around Steve’s throat. The blonde closed his eyes. Steve could hear the sound of Iron Man’s weapons systems, but he knew that he was shielding Bucky with his body. They couldn’t hurt his friend without endangering Steve. The Soldier’s fingers twitched once, just barely, before creeping up to rest on his cheek. 

“My mission is to take care of you, Steve. It always will be,” Bucky whispered.

Letting out a noise that was half laugh and half sob, Steve collapsed against his friend, pushing his face into the junction between Bucky’s neck and shoulder, hugging him fiercely. Steve didn’t know how this whole crazy situation happened, but it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter whether or not Pierce was telling the truth, because SHIELD, Hydra, whoever the enemy really was… he would rip them apart if that’s what it took to keep Bucky safe. 

“Til the end of the line,” Bucky murmured into his hair.

Steve sniffed loudly and laughed, a bit wetly. “Yeah, it was something you said to me, when-”

“After your mom died, I know.”

“You’ve gotten really good at that guessing game Buck,” Steve joked, stifling sobs and trembling against him. Bucky just held him tighter and stroked through his hair with his flesh arm, the way he always used to. 

“It’s alright Steve. It’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”

He was in a roofless Hydra facility, in the future, with a man in a flying metal suit hovering confusedly behind them. In that moment though, none of it mattered, because for the first time since he woke up in this twisted world, Steve felt like everything was going to be alright. Because he had Bucky now, and his friend was right. Everything was going to work out. 

~

“So let me get this straight,” Fury began, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You were captured by two AIM scientists, who actually turned out to by Hydra scientists. They couldn’t contain you for long, so they took you to a facility where the Winter Soldier was being stored, who turned out to be your long lost best friend Bucky Barnes. Through their incompetence, they actually order him to look after you, and you spend the next two days breaking him out of his programming. Then, the head honcho—who turns out to be the goddamn Secretary of Defense for the motherfucking United States of America—turns up, so you turn your tracking device back on… And don’t get me started about how fucking stupid you were to turn it off in the first place. And Pierce,” Fury spat the name out like it was a disease. “Somehow convinces you to fight for him, until you see Hawkeye and realize that every goddamn word out of his fucking mouth was a lie?”

Steve paused, considering. “That sounds about right, sir.” The Avengers are sitting in Fury’s office, plus Bucky. Everyone looks some degree of disbelieving at his crazy story, and Steve doesn’t blame them. Natasha is glancing at Bucky warily, and he suddenly remembers that they might have fought back in 2009. 

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” Fury scowled.

“You’re welcome for uncovering the secret Hydra cell that infiltrated SHIELD?” he drawled sarcastically. Fury grimaced at the reminder. “How are you doing at weeding out the moles, by the way?”

“Some of what Pierce told you was true,” Fury admitted grudgingly. “But we don’t think Hydra started infiltrating us randomly. The deeper we dig, the deeper the infestation seems to run. Right now Hill and I think that it started all the way back with Zola. Our theory is that he began turning people and recreating Hydra from within our ranks from the beginning, back in the fifties.”

“Are you serious?” blurted Stark.

“As a heart attack,” Fury confirmed grimly. “The whole damn situation is fucked nine ways to hell. The President is demanding we release Pierce into his custody, but the motherfucker offed himself with a cyanide pill during transport. Half of the troops he had in the Storage warehouse were SHIELD. When they were brought in, we started getting mutinies all over the place… guess it tipped off the moles. Project Insight is compromised, and will probably have to be scrapped completely. We’ve even identified a level 8 traitor.”

“Who?” Natasha asked, tone icy. 

“Sitwell.”

“Shit,” Barton hissed. “I trusted that guy.”

“We all did,” growled Fury. 

“We don’t have time for self-pity,” Steve said firmly. “If Hydra has infiltrated SHIELD that deep, there’s no telling how far their reach stretches. I’m going to fight them. Are you all going to join me?” He looked at the other Avengers in the room. One by one they nodded silently. Bucky reached over and squeezed his shoulder. Steve turned his gaze to Fury.

Fury scowled. “I don’t know if I can trust you,” he said to Bucky. “You might be a sleeper agent, or a mole, or have you own damn agenda… then again I don’t really know if I can trust any of you,” the man gestured at them all. “Every single one of you is a bad call in one way or another… but you’re all I’ve got. I guess it’s time for a leap of faith.” He didn’t look like he was happy about it.

Steve smiled, relaxing. “Alright Avengers, time to suit up. We’ve got work to do.”

~

Epilogue:

Nearly a year had passed since he’d rescued his friend from Hydra, and they were getting more and more opportunities to have quiet moments together. In the months immediately after the Reveal—as people were calling it—they’d hardly been able to spend any quality time together. They’d been shipped out to neutralize cell after cell. The only major player left was Strucker, and they were closing in on him slowly but surely. With so little of Hydra left, Steve had a lot more time for peaceful moments like this. 

“Bucky,” he murmured softly.

“Shh, Stevie. Let me take care of you,” the brunet whispered in his ear.

“You always do,” Steve agreed, smiling dopily at his friend and lover. Even after so long, he said that thinking about his mission would ground him, help keep quiet the programming that Hydra had stuck in his head. The blonde wrapped his arms around Bucky’s shoulders, pulling him into a kiss. They made out for a while, before Steve pulled back after one last nip at the brunet’s lips. They laid silently together for a moment.

“What’s going on in that big head of yours?” Bucky smiled. “I can always tell when you’re thinking too much for your own good.”

“Nothing,” he said softly. Bucky gave him an exasperated look. “Alright, okay. It’s just, sometimes I can’t help but think about what could’ve happened if I’d been less careless and hadn’t gotten captured by those Hydra thugs.” He had nightmares about it, actually, fairly regularly. He’d close his eyes and see Bucky’s face across from him on the battlefield, blank and ready to follow the kill order that Pierce gave him. 

“Hm,” Bucky said, considering. “It wouldn’t have mattered.”

Steve blinked, surprised. He’d expected Bucky to say something like ‘it didn’t happen, so stop thinking about it’. “What do you mean, it wouldn’t matter?” Steve asked incredulously. 

“You saved me, Steve, and trust me when I say that I’m grateful for it, but it would’ve happened one way or another. You and me, buddy? We’re destined. I become a prisoner of war? You get yourself injected with experimental super serum and come rescue me. You freeze yourself in a damn iceberg for the better part of the century? You better bet that I’ll figure out some way to get myself frozen too, even if it wasn’t exactly the best way I could’ve done it, granted.”

“That’s not funny, Bucky,” he said weakly. 

“Alright, maybe not,” the brunette agreed. “But the point is that there’s nowhere you can go that I won’t follow. If you hadn’t gotten captured by those goons, maybe things would’ve been worse, but one way or another I would’ve found my way back to you. You’re stuck with me for good, pal. ‘Til the end of the line.” 

Steve swallowed, speechless. It took him a few tries to find his voice. “You really think we’re destined to be together?”

“I don’t know about destiny,” Bucky chuckled. “But what I do know is that we’re two dumb punks too stupid and too in love to ever leave the other all by himself. My mission is to take care of you, and that’s what I’m going to do,” he said definitively. 

Steve couldn’t help but believe him. After everything they’d been through, the chances that they’d end up here, together, and happy… they were minuscule. Maybe there was a God out there looking after them. Maybe it really was destiny. Steve didn’t know and he didn’t care, because Bucky was right. He would do anything—move the world off its axis, if that’s what it took—to make sure that they got to keep each other this time. 

“I love you, Bucky.”

“I love you too, punk.”

They smiled at each other, blissful and in love. In that moment none of the pain and hardship in their past mattered, since they were together again. Steve shifted suddenly, becoming aware of his awakened body. “Speaking of taking care of me… how do you feel about round two?” 

Bucky’s smile morphed into a smirk, and he leaned his weight fully onto Steve with a groan. “Buddy, I thought you’d never ask.”

~

**Author's Note:**

> So that's that. If you're curious, Tony disables the kill switch in Bucky's arm off-screen. I wanted to flesh this story out a bit more, have more in the intervening times, and expand on Bucky's recovery process, but I wasn't willing to make this into an epic, and it seemed pretty complete as was, so... I might post little one shots as sequels to this story if I get the inspiration. :)
> 
> TW: Mentions (but no actual acts) of torture. Incapacitation through chemical means (namely: I.C.E.R.s from Agents of Shield), uh... everything related to the Winter Soldier? If there's more that you find, please let me know and I'll edit this.


End file.
